Abstract:

Kitāb al-Adab al-Dunyā wa al-Dīn is a work written by an 11th century Baṣran scholar, al-Māwardī. This work was not originally written in tafsīr genre but contains so many opinions that fall into the field of tafsīr. That is the reason why it has been chosen as the subject of our study. This book examines theoretical and practical moral issues systematically and with a rich content, and supports almost all topics in the light of the Qurʾānic verses. In his work, the author tries to understand any particular subject in the Qurʾānby giving priority to the interpreting a verse through other verses or ḥadīth but not neglecting the comments of the companions, followers or later scholars, and this constitutes the main aspect of his tafsīr methodology. This work reflects the author's original views and preferences, and aims to demonstrate that how the Qurʾānand the Sunnah determine the general boundaries of the individual and social morality. In this work, the author follows the similar tafsīr method in his work titled al Nukat wa al ‘Uyūn. Although he takes the narrations as the prime reference, he does not neglect to resort the method of dirāyah tafsīr. The main purpose of this study is to determine the way in which the verses are interpreted in the works of akhlāq and adab with special reference to al- Māwardī’s Kitāb al-Adab al-Dunyā wa al-Dīn. It seems that such studies, which can be considered as examples of thematic tafsīr, were also accepted as references for later works in terms of tafsīr methodology.

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